Here's Where It Gets Weird

September 9, 1975

Yesterday was my first day in San Francisco after a month on the Ideal City Ranch up in Boonville, California, in Mendocino County. It was clearly a month that has altered my life -- completely changed me for the good. It was the time I found God.

Just about 5 weeks ago I came to San Francisco for no good reason other than the fact that I had nowhere else to go. Our little band of travelers was down to Jerry and me. Everyone else either had to go back to school or had to be somewhere else.

Jerry and I were on the side of the road outside of Yellowstone. He had changed the oil on the van, letting the dirty oil spill on the ground. He didn't care. I also had learned that Jerry kept stolen phone card numbers in his wallet, which he used to make long distance calls all over the world for free. He told me he got them from somebody who worked for the corporations that owned the numbers. He said the calls look like any others on the bill and they would never find out. Ripping off big companies was not a big deal to Jerry. He didn't see it as illegal. He even gave me one to call my dad back in Dover. I was surprised how easily it worked. I kept the number in my wallet for a long time, but I never used it again.

I didn't know where to go. I was hoping Jerry would ask me to come with him to California, but I didn't say so. He asked me what I was going to do and I told him I didn't know. Then he said he wished I'd come with him to San Francisco, which is what I wanted to hear, so I said yes.

We drove all night, picking up hitchhikers until the van was almost full. The van was an old work vehicle that had two side doors that opened wide. They didn't stay closed too well, and Jerry had put a hasp and padlock to keep them closed. I guess he forgot to put the padlock on after we picked up a hitchhiker because somewhere during the night along the highway in the desert, while I was driving, both doors suddenly flew open. We never could tell if someone had fallen out or not. We didn't know how many people we had picked up. Somebody had been leaning on the door, but no one knew if anyone was missing, and it was too dark to see down the road behind us. Jerry locked the doors and we drove on. Somebody gave us an 8-track of "Dark Side of the Moon," which we played all the way to Reno.

The sun was just coming up when we got to Reno. Everyone bailed out and went their separate ways. It was just me and Jerry again. We had almost no money and we needed gas. Jerry said we could make it playing blackjack at the 50-cent table. I didn't think it was a good idea. I had always heard that when you gamble you lose everything. But Jerry said we would make enough to fill up the tank because he knew how to play. I believed him because he was a lot older than me, so we went into the nearest casino and headed to the blackjack tables. The casinos were nearly empty at that hour and we were the only ones at the table. Jerry told me all we had to do was stick on anything higher than 16 and hit on 16 or lower. It worked and about 20 minutes later we were about $5 richer. We filled up the tank for about $3.50 and spent the rest on the cheap breakfast at the casino. Then it was back on the highway. We reached San Francisco that afternoon.

The next day, Jerry left me alone with the van. I cruised around San Rafael, Novato and Mill Valley, looking for Grateful Dead houses and whatnot while Jerry tried to talk Imoe into coming east with him. I came into the city the next day.

Jerry hadn't wanted me around because he thought it would be weird for me and Imoe since we used to live together in Atlanta. But it wasn't, except for Jerry. Imoe and I got along fine. We even took a walk around the city a bit. She was staying at 269 Frederick Street in the Haight-Ashbury district, where her ex-husband Michael lived. Imoe didn't want to get back together with him. She just needed a place for her and her son to crash until they could find a place.

She told me Michael was an artist, but I only saw one thing he did. It was an ink drawing of a woman's leg in a fishnet stocking with wings and lots of little weird details, sort of like the Yellow Submarine. There was a big one in a frame in the bedroom. It was really well done, but I saw it in smaller drawings all around the house too. I wondered if maybe Michael only had one picture in him and he did it over and over.

Anyway, Imoe and I were walking in Golden Gate Park and she was telling me she couldn't get into Jerry but she could get into me but that she also understood that I had things to do. After I got together with Karola at the Grand Canyon, she had told me she realized that when I had moved in with her on Clifton Road in Atlanta that I wasn't expecting to have a family. Her little boy Jason was a handful, and sometimes I lost my temper. One time he went out in the rain in his slippers and I hit him on the bottom with my belt because my dad had done that to me once or twice and I thought it was OK. But it left a big welt and a bruise on him, which was bad because he was only four. Another time I thought throwing him in a creek was the way to teach him to swim. He was so scared and screamed so loud that Imoe ran into the creek and pulled him out. Both times I thought I was right and I got angry about it.

She and Jason had left me with Karola at the Grand Canyon three weeks earlier. Now we were walking through Golden Gate Park and she was saying she still wanted to be with me. I just said how crazy and uncertain our lives had become, living a very vicarious day-to-day existence, that we didn't even know where the next meal was coming from, yet that was OK because something always came along. But I also said I felt I had done everything I had wanted to do up to that point in my life and I wasn't sure what I should do next. My exact words were "I feel I am at the end of my rope." I didn't mean it in a negative way, just that I had run out of options, but I also felt something good was about to happen.

At that precise moment a small but very dynamic young man walked by. He was with a cute girl, but he was the magnetic force of the two. We exchanged hellos. I remember being struck by his smile. It was too big for such a casual situation. I actually mocked him as we walked on, exaggerating my face into a huge toothy grin. He suddenly called back to us and said, "Would you like to come to dinner?" Without thinking I said yes to a free meal.

His names was James Brooks and he had the most brilliant and fascinating blue eyes. He handed me a pamphlet that had his address on it. He told me he lived with a group of people who were living according to some principles. He kept saying that word, "principles," repeatedly, but I didn't know what he was talking about. I didn't consider it important. I was only interested in a free meal.

I told Imoe afterward that I had a feeling that he was a very magical person. I also said I had a feeling this is what I had been looking for, yet I didn't know why. I didn't understand what he had said.

I went to dinner that night. Neither Jerry nor Imoe was interested.

The address was a very nice townhouse in Pacific Heights, a posh neighborhood overlooking the bay. The outside was in good repair, and the inside was spotless. I was asked to take my shoes off. I thought that was odd but I did. Everyone was so friendly and happy. I was sort of put off by their straight appearance. I was obviously too cool for these people. But I thought I could humor them for an evening. They sang songs like there was no tomorrow and I went along. Somehow I had a great time.

The food was not remarkable, strictly vegetables and brown rice, but I was happy to eat anything, especially if it was free. I didn't really get to eat much because I was surrounded by James and three other people, including some cute girl, who kept asking me questions. I noticed they didn't eat at all. They made me feel like I was the most fascinating person they had ever met, and it made me feel really good. Before I could get seconds the food was taken away and we were herded into another room with chairs. I thought I'd go home after the meal, but apparently some entertainment was planned. Somebody with a guitar led everybody in songs that were a little too loud and enthusiastic. I knew they were putting on a show of exaggerated joy, but I saw no harm in it. I wanted to be a polite guest and then I'd leave.

Somebody named David, the leader of the group, started talking about three blind men and an elephant and how nobody could agree on what the elephant really was. And then he told a story about starving people at a banquet loaded with the most delicious foods in the world, but they only had 10-foot chopsticks to eat with. No matter how hard they tried, they couldn't use the chopsticks to eat. Then someone used their chopsticks to feed someone else and then everyone started doing it and that's how they all finally ate their fill.

David also said they had a big farm up in Mendecino where people lived and raised food. That sounded perfect to me. Someplace I could hang out for a while, do some honest work, while I figured out what I was going to do next.

We sang a couple more songs and James said they had a bus that was going to the farm that night and I could go if I wanted. I told him I did. But then he told me I'd have to pay and my heart sank. I told him I didn't have any money. David came over and James told him what I said. David said if I got the money I could come to the farm on the weekend. Before I left, James invited me to come back the following night for dinner. I went back to Frederick Street, really wanting to go to the farm but feeling I probably wouldn't get to because I was broke. I tried to convey to Imoe and Jerry what a great time I had, but they were skeptical.

The next day, a Thursday, Jerry and Imoe dropped the last of the LSD and went out to Point Reyes. I took care of Jason. I knew this was going to be Jerry's big push to get Imoe to come back to NY with him, but I also knew she'd probably say no. When I asked them about Point Reyes the next day, all they could say was they had seen a seal and that it was a good acid trip (but apparently could have been much better).

The next night I went back to Pacific Heights for what I thought would be another free dinner. This time, though, they asked me for $1. I told them I didn't have any money and they let me in anyway. The program was exactly like it was two nights earlier. Even the songs were the same, and the stories about the elephant and the chopsticks were almost word for word. But all I cared about was whether they'd let me go to their farm, even if I didn't have any money. 

Big Sur Prize

September 9, 1975 (cont.)

That Friday night I went up to Mendecino for the weekend. I got into the lectures too much, I thought, and I left Sunday night to gain a little objectivity.

Imoe had moved out of Frederick Street on Sunday morning over to 365 29th Street, and I had this gut feeling when I got dropped off at Frederick Street that I had made a mistake coming back. But I had sort of promised Jerry I would go to Big Sur with him. As I got out of the van, I gave James a tape recorder I had been carrying around in my backpack. I had used it to record lectures during my year at the University of Vermont. James was so thrilled to have it. He said he had wanted one to record the lectures at the farm so he could study them.

Jerry picked me up at Frederick Street on Monday morning. He took one look at me and got angry and said I had been brainwashed. I didn't understand why he was so upset. I felt fine and I tried to tell him it was a good experience, but he said he didn't trust these people. He said he had met people like them in NY and it was a cult who worshiped a guy named Rev. Moon from Korea, but I said I didn't know what he was talking about, that no one had said anything like that the whole weekend. But he was still pissed and said I would see he was right.

He wanted me to go down to LA with him, and maybe into Mexico. We drove down to Big Sur. On the drive into the campground, we passed the actor Purnell Roberts from "Bonanza," who was riding in the passenger side of an open Jeep. He sort of nodded to us. Later we saw a really fancy new green GMC RV at one of the campsites. Someone said it was Kenny Loggins, from Loggins and Messina.

I had no money at the time. I also developed diarrhea and a loss of balance. At the same time, I felt some inner joy I had never experienced. I wanted to go back to San Francisco. I had a dream Monday night in which Jerry was killed violently. It was very vivid and real. Jerry and I were walking up to our campsite and there were some people sitting around our campfire playing our guitars. Jerry was angry they had taken our guitars out of his van. But then one of the men picked up a piece of firewood and threw it at Jerry, breaking his neck. He fell down dead in front of me. I was terrified and took off running. The people started chasing me. I knew I couldn't outrun them and I'd have to fight. I picked up a big stick and stood to face them. But they dropped their clubs and sort of smiled at me and then I woke up.

Jerry was already up, making breakfast over the fire. It surprised me to see him still alive. The dream left me very disturbed. I wanted to know why I had been so changed or affected after just two days. I felt I had missed something important at the farm. I was ready to leave Jerry and hitchhike back to San Francisco.

But Jerry wanted me to go to Hearst San Simeon. It sounded interesting, so I stayed another day. Jerry bought some Coors on the way. I tried to drink one, but I really didn't want it and only drank about half. At the Hearst Castle, I was amazed and fascinated and appalled by the incredible greed of this one man. All the land as far as you could see in any direction had belonged to him. I couldn't get over the swimming pool with the gold tiles. I tried to smell some of the roses that were in bloom, but they had no odor. It was like everything was fake. It was the straw that broke this camel's back.

I vowed to myself that I would go back to San Francisco the next day. I had no dream that night, and when I woke up I put together my pack and said goodbye to Jerry. He was bummed, but he didn't try to stop me. I walked over a few campsites where a bunch of hippies were piling into the back of an old pickup truck. They told me I could ride with them as far as they were going. I sat in the back next to a nice chick who was admiring my buckskin fringe coat.

The leather coat was one of my most prized possessions. I had bought it from Larry Laporte back in Dover, and he had gotten it from Gerry Foote, one of the teachers at Dover High. I almost never wore it, but I loved it. It was really beautiful and amazing with long fringes and buttons made from slices of antler. It even had leather dope bags attached to the pockets. On the inside was a leather tag that said East West Musical Instrument Co. It was the kind of coat a rock star would wear.

When the pickup truck finally pulled over, I was about halfway to San Francisco. I untied the leather coat from my backpack and gave it to the girl. I told her I didn't need it anymore and she could have it. She couldn't believe it. I could see how happy it made her. It made me happy too, and it made my pack a lot lighter.

They had dropped me off next to the highway, and I got a ride within a couple minutes. A short time later I was dropped off at a gas station in San Francisco. It was bright and sunny. I had no idea where I was. I was trying to figure out what to do when a man with silver hair pulled up to the curb in a dark gray Mercedes convertible. He said: "Where are you going? I'll take you anywhere you want to go."

I told him I wanted to go to my friend's house, but I didn't know where she lived. He asked me a couple questions, and I remembered a little bit of her address. He said he knew exactly where it was, in the Castro district, and he took me there. I don't remember if we talked at all on the way. A short time later he dropped me off at Imoe's door on 29th Street, gave me a smile and then drove away. I could not have driven myself from Big Sur to Imoe's house any faster.

After all the negativity Jerry had displayed, Imoe's positivity was refreshing. She encouraged me to go back to Mendecino. I told her I wanted to go for a week and hear the rest of the lectures, but I didn't want to be involved with any group. So I stayed with Imoe for two days and then went back to 2269 Washington Street for dinner again with the intention of going to the land for a week. James was really overjoyed that I came back, for he felt that I probably would not and that's why he had tried so desperately to get me to stay the first time I had come. But he said when I gave him the tape recorder, he knew I'd be back.

Before the end of my first week on the farm, Thursday night, Jerry drove up to see me, to try to get me away. They wouldn't let him on the property, but he refused to leave without seeing me. Finally someone came and got me and James and I walked down the road to the locked gate. Jerry was on the other side. James and two other brothers stood by me to make sure Jerry didn't try to take me. He said the group was part of Rev. Moon's cult, but I said I didn't think so because I hadn't heard anything about a Rev. Moon, and in any case I wasn't leaving and that Jerry should come inside and see for himself. Jerry tried to convince me to leave for a few more minutes, warning me that I was being brainwashed, but finally he gave up. It was really sad to see him walking away in the twilight with his head down and his boots kicking up little clouds of dust. I turned around with James and walked back to the group. James asked me if I was OK, and I said I wanted to stay.

I had no intention of leaving with Jerry, but afterward for the first time I was intensely homesick. I wanted to go to Dover to see my parents and tell them about the incredible things I had learned. James told me it was evil spirits trying to lure me away from the truth that I had found there and that I should really stay for several weeks until my spirit was stronger. The desire diminished completely.

On Tuesday of my second week, Imoe called. She was freaked out by things Jerry had told her about the Family, and about James and Mitch coming by her house to get my pack and things. But I couldn't explain to her what was happening. I could only say it was cool and she didn't need to worry. Jerry also called my parents when he got back east and apparently got them a little upset too, though my mother did not display that in the note she wrote me.

I spent the next couple weeks listening eagerly to all the lectures and giving 100 percent in all the activities. I did everything the group did, and all the strange things like constantly holding hands with other guys and never being alone didn't bother me anymore. I felt alive and excited and reborn. We had group sharing all the time to talk about what we heard in the lectures. This truth was just blowing my mind and I couldn't get enough of it. Even when I was picking zucchini in the field, I was thinking about the lectures.

We played dodge ball every day as our exercise. The secret to not getting hit was to keeping chanting so you'd be protected by good spirits. It really seemed to work. Whenever I got hit I'd feel guilty for not having deep enough faith and letting Satan invade, then I'd repent and vow to be better.

We did something called Choo-Choo Pow all the time. We would all stand in a circle, holding hands, and then in unison go "Choo-choo-choo, choo-choo-choo, choo-choo-choo, yea... Pow!" It seemed to clear the spiritual atmosphere and bring everybody together into the same space. At first I thought it was really corny, but after a couple days I really got into it.

The older brothers and sisters talked all the time about a woman named Onni, who lived with the group in Oakland. She was the spiritual leader of the San Francisco Family, and whenever she was coming to Boonville, everyone would get super excited and go crazy cleaning the place. A couple times we thought she was coming, but she never showed up.

There was one single-wide trailer on the property, which served as a kitchen and sleeping quarters for the older sisters. Sometimes we'd have lectures there, and the vacuum cleaner didn't work, so I'd crawl across the green shag carpet on my hands and knees and pick out the dirt and lint with my fingers.

The lectures were held in a place called the Chicken Palace, an old chicken barn with wooden floors and a metal roof and walls that were open to the outside. At night many of the brothers would sleep on the floor in the Chicken Palace. There were also some lean-tos made of black plastic where some other brothers slept, and there was an outdoor group shower area made of black plastic. There was also a public restroom with several stalls on each side for men and women. On the other side of the zucchini field was the original farm house. It was off limits except for the senior staff, like Noah Ross, who was the lecturer. But I did stay there for a couple days when I got a bad cold.

James never let go of my hand my first week at Boonville. Even when I needed to use the bathroom, he walked me over the restroom and then waited for me outside.

There was one cute sister named Donna, and she had been love-bombing me when I first got to the farm and I really liked her. But whenever I tried to hold her hand, or hold hands with any other sister, one of the older sisters would break us apart and say that's how Satan invades. I didn't really understand, but I quickly learned not to get too close to sisters and just hang out with brothers unless we were in a group activity. Otherwise the brothers and sisters kept apart. After all the sex of the past couple years, I was grateful for the break.

One of the sisters said that Onni said if we were really sincere, we could reach perfection in three days. I determined I could do it, and I immediately started fasting and praying and chanting constantly. But on the second day one of the sisters noticed I wasn't eating. When I explained I was determined to become perfect in three days, she made me stop fasting. She said it would be a lot harder than just fasting and praying, but she didn't say how. I decided not to give up, and kept praying and chanting nonstop. But on the end of the third day, I didn't feel any different.

In my third week they started talking about fundraising -- selling flowers -- as the fastest way to perfection, and that got me really excited again. I couldn't wait to go sell flowers and knock off all my fallen nature and become perfect like Jesus. The lectures had made it seem so clear and easy and I was desperate to be part of the flower team that was going to go up to Coos Bay for a couple days.

But when I asked, Noah said no, that my spirit wasn't strong enough yet and I needed to stay on the farm and actualize the Principle there. I was so disappointed because there weren't enough opportunities to actualize the Principle by playing dodge ball and picking zucchini and praying and listening to lectures and love-bombing the new guests who would show up, just like I had. I didn't want Satan to invade me, so I was determined not to complain, but I couldn't wait for my time on the farm to be up so I could go back to the city and start working hard toward perfection. 

Gimme Shelter

September 9, 1975 (cont.)

I am now a reborn person for Heavenly Father -- hereafter referred to as HF. My first mission was to sell flowers -- roses -- in San Francisco. My first run was with Kent in a section of Market Street. We did about $14 between us. Ran into a lot of negatively in this one area near Carlos Santana's health food restaurant. One guy said that we were all the same, that we were all fascist groups.

In the Pilsner Bar across the street I tried to sell a rose to an old lady, but before I could get the flower out the old guy sitting next to her told me to take a hike. I kept trying, but Kent finally pulled me away and said that it was useless to get involved with such low spirits, that it could really be harmful to my spirit.

Later in the day, Mitch, our center man, told me that HF would deal severely with people like that old guy and Jerry who turned people away from the truth.

My second run was on 24th Street, where Kent scored a Bud's french vanilla cone, but we didn't sell so many flowers. Managed to sell half a dozen just when the van came at the end of the run at lunchtime. Then I did a run downtown, but I was very self-conscious of my clothes, which were my old army fatigues with the big side pockets and my dirty sweater. I didn't sell many flowers at all until right at the very end when I sold a dozen. The presence of Satan was so obvious, but I tried not to get negative or bummed out, knowing that HF was counting on me.

We then dropped our crew off at Powell and Market and Union Square to witness. Mitch took me up to 29th Street to get the rest of my things, but Imoe had moved, so I went to the feminist daycare across the street where Jason was and they said she had moved to 23rd Street with a guy named Moon. We went over there and I managed by the grace of HF to see Imoe alone for a few minutes while Mitch parked the van. I knew I would not be left alone for long.

Moon was a skinny Asian guy and I only saw him for a split second before he disappeared. I told Imoe I was OK -- better than OK -- and she shouldn't worry about me. I wanted to witness to her about the Principle, but I could see she wasn't in the mood to hear it. After weeks of turmoil, she had found a good place to live for now with Moon and everything was all right. But I could tell that seeing me made her kind of sad. I felt it would be best to get my things and leave as soon as possible.

Mitch knocked on the door just as I was about to leave. Thank you HF. Among the clothes I picked up was an old denim shirt that Leslie Heinz had given me a couple years earlier in Dover. She had embroidered "Gimme Shelter" on the front pocket and it was one of my favorite shirts. But holding it made me think of Leslie and how much I missed her. I knew Satan would use it to invade me, so I threw it up the stairs to Imoe, who caught it and held it to her face and started crying. I ran out the door.

Mitch treated me to some more Bud's ice cream and then we drove back downtown to pick up the witnessers and dinner guests they had invited. I guess we love-bombed them pretty good because we had 14 sign up for the weekend workshop at Boonville. Thank you HF.

After the guests had left and we gathered as a family, we had ice cream and individual entertainment. The room seemed wrapped in a golden glow. Never have I experienced such inner warmth. I knew this was just the beginning, the first day of many to come.

The Red Red Robin has just called. It's 5 a.m. I've been up all night writing down as much as I can while I can still remember it. Time to do battle with this sinful world and restore it to God's ideal. Thank you HF. I love you. 

Upon Further Reflection...

September 13, 1975

Just got back from my first weekend at Boonville since moving into the Washington Street center a week ago. The whole time I kept thinking about my very first weekend workshop and I thought I would try to remember some of the key things that I experienced.

One of the first images I had was of Camp Asbury, where my family lived for a couple years outside of Hiram, Ohio, when I was in fourth and fifth grade. Boonville reminded me of summer camp.

The lecturer that weekend was Dr. Durst, Onni's husband. He had the worst hair I'd ever seen. He was obviously bald but had grown his black hair long on one side and then plastered it over the top of his head. I couldn't understand how someone could deliberately look that way and think no one would notice. It was almost comical and very distracting.

I remember being pretty bored and sleepy the first lecture or two and being freaked out by James holding my hand all the time. At the Washington Street center the first time I came to dinner I was on the lookout for signs James was part of some kind of religious group, but I never saw any. Now it was clear that this was a religious group because they kept talking about God like it was a person.

Dr. Durst mentioned the Bible, but it was different from what I expected. He'd quote some scripture and then explain it in a way I never heard before, but somehow it made a lot more sense to me. But I was mad because I felt tricked, and I felt trapped because I couldn't leave until Sunday. I tried not to listen to Dr. Durst. Instead I sat there thinking about a girl I knew in high school back in Dover whose house I would go to sometimes to do homework and we'd end up having amazing sex. A couple times when her parents were out of town I spent the night with her, playing Neil Young on her stereo and balling all night. She had a great little body and just thinking about it made all those memories come back. The daydreaming got me through the morning.

It bugged me that everybody was so cheerful all the time. It didn't seem real or genuine, but they were so insistent that it was hard to call them phony, even though I wanted to. I just wanted to get away by myself for a few minutes, but James was always right there. I felt like I was drowning in love.

I thought dodge ball would be a fun, but I hated it the first time we played it. Our team was supposed to chant in unison, "Bomb with love! Bomb with love!" really loud. And other team was screaming "Love conquers all! Love conquers all!" even louder. One sister started scolding me for not chanting and it made me mad. I just wanted to play the game, but they had turned it into some kind of exercise in spiritual warfare.

I was in Poppy's group that weekend. I really felt like I had made a big mistake in coming and I couldn't wait for the weekend to be over. But then she would hold my hand and act like I was somebody special and I wouldn't feel so negative. Then she would ignore me and pay attention to somebody else.

I woke up Sunday knowing I'd get to go home in the afternoon. I looked forward to it, but not as much as the day before. For some reason I couldn't explain, I didn't feel so negative. I was fairly impressed by the lecture about Jesus and the sharings of David and Kristina. Actually, David's sharing bored me, but Kristina started talking about taking a leap of faith. She said it was like you were stranded on the side of a cliff and couldn't go up or down, and somebody dropped you a rope but it was out of your reach and the only way to reach it was to take a leap of faith that you would catch it and you would survive. That made sense to me. Then she said something that really hit me, because before coming to Boonville I really didn't have any hope for the world. I thought nuclear war was pretty certain in the near future. But Kristina said even if there's only one-billionth of one percent of hope in what they were doing, it was better than no hope at all.

By the time the van was ready to leave that afternoon for the city, I no longer wanted to go. But I had promised myself I would and no matter how hard they tried to get me to change my mind, I refused. James, Poppy and Big Jim all tried to talk me into staying, just for a week. James kept saying how amazing and incredible it was, and I believed him. But I had made up my mind to go and they finally gave up.

After they dropped me off in the city at Frederick Street, I gave James the Sony cassette deck. I knew in my heart I wanted to go back to Boonville. I had a very uncomfortable two days with Jerry. It seemed parts of the lectures, even when I was trying not to listen, kept coming back to me, pertinent to whatever I was doing or thinking. It was disturbing, yet I was fascinated by the power of the word.

So I came back to San Francisco and stayed with Imoe. We threw the tarot cards one night, but the reading was really ambiguous, except for one card which I drew as an extra because the other cards were so unclear. It was the Thirteen, or Death card. That really freaked me out. I thought it meant I was going to die. But it turned out to be the one concept destined to make the biggest impression on me, but of course I didn't know that at the time. Imoe finally said I shouldn't be afraid.

I went back to Washington Street the next night and then up to Boonville, planning to stay on the land for a week to learn the truth and then split for the Grand Canyon or someplace to think it over.

One of the first people to greet me in Boonville was Reid, who was in my group last weekend and had stayed for the week. He seemed different than I remembered. His eyes were really bright and he was smiling, really smiling. Something he experienced during the week had made him very happy, and it made me want to have that experience too. He said he was hoping I would come back.

I was in Big Jim's group, which I was a little disappointed about because I wanted to be in Poppy's group again. But it didn't make any difference because the rest of the week was like the light show at the end of "2001." I felt like I was just being accelerated faster and faster every day. The lectures were just blowing me away.

Sometime on Friday of that first week I asked Reid if he knew who the messiah was and he said yes but that there wasn't a need to talk about it. So then I knew that I really had to stay.

I remember taking my meditation hour downstream, where I found a freshly dead vulture. I figured the place might be symbolic so I prayed there, somehow reaching the conclusion that Dr. Durst must be the messiah. As soon as the idea came into my head I knew it had to be true.

Also during the week, Jim Hassan, an Egyptian business executive who had been in my group that first weekend after I came back (actually my second weekend), he came back on Thursday after having left after the weekend for some reason. While we were hiking off for a special reading, I started flashing on Jim Hassan really being an Arab spy who had come to kill Dr. Durst with a bomb disguised as a tape deck or radio. I got very upset, especially when I noticed he wasn't in the group hiking up the hill. I didn't know what to do, so I prayed to HF that I was wrong.

Then Jennifer read to us about the man who brought the Principle to us. I was expecting her to say Dr. Durst, but when she said Sun Myung Moon I couldn't believe it. My heart didn't want to accept it. But when I prayed about it on the hillside, I realized I was wrong, just as I had asked to be. I had been tricked into overcoming my prejudice. Fifteen minutes later I knew in my heart who the real messiah was.

The next day, Saturday, I told James I really wanted to go home and see my parents one last time before committing myself to this new life. But he said it would be foolish, that now that I knew who the messiah was, Satan would play on all of my emotions and try to draw me away from the Family. He said I was vulnerable and open to attack and that I should wait until my spirit man was stronger. He said I was one of the most prepared people he had ever met, and that if I left something might happen to me or my family, that Satan was ruthless against God's people. He said some people who had been really prepared had left and then got into terrible accidents. It scared the crap out of me.

That night I prayed very hard for several hours it seemed, asking for forgiveness of all of the sins I could think of. But overall I felt like I was facing a wall. I had a terrible headache and my sinus in the forehead was filled with mucus. I wanted so much to break down and cry, but I only managed a couple tears. I finally got up to go to the bathroom when I saw a light out of the corner of my eye. When I looked at it, I saw that there was a fire over at the fireplace. I remembered what James had said about evil spirits being all around and that it was not good for me to be out alone. But I ignored my conscience and walked over to where I had seen the fire. There was no fire. Only glowing coals.

So I threw a few sticks on and built a small fire. Then Jim Bob showed up. He had a bad chest cold and his coughing had woken up the rest of the lean-to, so they sent him down to the barn to sleep. We only spoke for a minute and after a few minutes my fire died down and I walked back toward the lean-to. But just as I got halfway across the riverbed, I heard a most hellacious bird call off to my left, answered by another call about equidistant to my right. I was frightened but stood still and listened for a minute. It was so weird.

The next morning I woke up with a terrible chest cold. I tried fighting it out in exercises and song practice, but most of all I found I could cry. Especially the lecture about Jesus and how his crucifixion was the worst thing that ever happened in the history of mankind since the Fall of Man. Noah was so passionate about it that it was like I was watching it happen all over again and it just tore me up inside. I couldn't stop bawling for hours. 

Chased by the Dead

September 16, 1975

I had a couple of dreams that first week at Boonville. The first was on the first night I came back. I had an image of looking out over the land from inside a rainbow.

The other dream I had was a few nights later. It was similar to the one I had in Big Sur. Jerry and I had pulled into a gas station with the Dodge van. There was another car there, a shiny, old-fashioned black Bentley or Rolls with big headlights, except it had a third headlight right in the middle on top of the chrome radiator. A middle-aged man came up to me and said I was not going to Cucamunga like I thought. I was about to protest but the next thing I knew he was chasing me.

I ran across a field, and as I ran I was thinking about tripping and the Grateful Dead, and then I cut through some trees where I came to a white house. There was an elderly woman standing outside, very passive and benevolent. I tried to hide behind some sort of large pillar in the yard. I put my hands on it and it felt like sand. I looked down at my feet and saw the pillar had no base. Then the man showed up. He extended his hand, but I only grasped his fingertips. They were cold and greasy or clammy. He and the old woman led me inside where there was a large group of people sitting around a table, and the man said: "He's come home." 

UVM Flashback

September 16, 1975 (cont.)

During my second week at Boonville I developed a bad cold. Imoe called once, very upset that I hadn't come back at the end of the first week as I said I would. I went back to the place where the dead vulture was and picked some blackberries for Noah and Reid and the rest of the people who were sick and staying at the farm house. By the end of the day I had joined them. My cold was so bad I didn't do much except sleep in my sleeping bag on the floor and eat well and be well cared for.

My blond hair had grown long over the summer, almost down to my shoulders, the longest it had ever been. I got it cut by Neddy, who ran the farming part of the property. It felt good to see myself with short hair again. I felt like a new person.

Poppy was sick too, and I had a chance to be with her for a couple days and hear her testimony about joining the Family. It was a story that was starting to sound familiar although each one was unique. It was like a musical theme with infinite variations.

Being around her reminded me of some things that I had experienced at the University of Vermont two years earlier. One was when I was standing in a hallway in front of a bulletin board and looking at a flier about Rev. Moon coming to speak on campus. I remember thinking at the time, "Oh great. Just what the world needs. Another evangelist." And I heard a voice behind me, even though I don't remember there being anyone else in the hallway. It said: "Are you going to see Rev. Moon?" I said no. The voice said: "Don't you know who he is?" I said no. I turned around but didn't see anyone.

Last November I had hitchhiked to UVM to visit my friends from the year before. I wasn't a student anymore, which was ironic. At the start of my freshman year I was the only person who had plans to stay in college because I wanted to be a doctor. Everyone else said they didn't plan on staying more than a year because they wanted to do something else. But in the end I was the only one who didn't stay. Instead I had gotten a Class 5 license over the summer and was going to move to Atlanta and drive trucks. I was excited about it and imagined my friends would be too when I told them, because we had talked about it the entire year before. Now I was really going to live my dream of being an over-the-road trucker.

The hitch north from Dover to Burlington was very strange. First I got picked up in Dover out on Highway 13 by a guy with a brand new Mercedes. He was so proud of that car that he couldn't stop talking about it. But even before we got to New Jersey, a warning light came on that the car was overheating and he had to pull over. I got out and started hitching again and finally made it to New York City, but it was hard to hitchhike through the city and took me most of the day. I remember walking up one of the entrance ramps to the freeway going toward Connecticut and seeing a brown hubcap for a Mercedes. It was the same color as the one that picked me up in Dover. I managed to get a ride to Hartford with a guy who let me crash with him.

The next morning he made us breakfast and then he pulled out a plastic bag of cocaine. I had never seen it before, only heard about it. It was a lot, like two fingers. We snorted some coke and then he said he'd give me a ride to the edge of town heading toward Vermont. The coke made us both very talkative, and several hours later he dropped me on the side of highway deep inside Vermont. It was cold, but I had on my black leather jacket with a Grateful Dead skull and roses emblem on the back that an old man had given me back in Dover.

The man was a customer at the PandB Market on Bradford Street where I worked part-time next to Wesley College, where my mother taught. He saw I had shiny new red Honda SL350 parked outside the store, which I had paid $800 for, and came in one day and gave me the jacket. He said his wife wanted to throw it out, but he'd rather I have it. I bought a large Grateful Dead patch from an ad in National Lampoon magazine, embroidered it myself, and sewed it on the back of the jacket. The bike was later stolen, but I still had the jacket.

At UVM I crashed with Laurie Bobker, who had been my girlfriend the year before, and Brett Gold. They had an apartment at the Living-Learning Center on campus where we had all lived the year before in freshmen suites that each housed six or seven students apiece.

The next day I was walking around campus and one of my friend's introduced me to a man named Thomas. He was a friend of a guy who lived with Jim Carroll, one of my suite-mates from the year before.

It was the night of the Beach Boys concert at UVM and I was totally undecided about going. I was reading "Steppenwolf" at Laurie and Brett's when Jim Carroll came over and invited me to come up to Bolten Valley Ski Lodge with him and Thomas, so I went.

Thomas was very strange. He was quiet but really intense in a creepy way. I had found out by hanging out with him earlier in the day that he was 32 and had been a Jesuit until recently. I could tell he had a lot of sexual problems that I couldn't handle, so I got to feeling very uncomfortable around him.

That night at the lodge someone came over with both hash and mescaline. We opened the capsules of mescaline and snorted the brown powder like cocaine. The psychedelic rush was so powerful I could hardly stand it.

Thomas, who had also taken the mescaline, got up from the sunken living room and went up the steps to the dining area, which overlooked the living room. It made me feel really strange and I flashed on him being God about to grant any last requests. I knew I would freak out if I dwelled on it, so I turned my back on him and stared at the fire in the fireplace, rocking in the rocking chair, listening to the Grateful Dead, staring at a blank white wall filled with images too fantastic to describe.

Suddenly the words "Cosmic Puppy" came to me. The image of a puppy innocently tripping through the universe on the heels of the Grateful Dead appealed to me so strongly that I instantly forgot about Thomas and I took off.

I felt like I was in outer space, tripping among the stars. The joy I felt was indescribable. We played a bootleg recording from a Grateful Dead live show, which lasted for hours, and then Pink Floyd. The experience lasted until dawn. In the early morning hours when we were coming down, we put on Chick Corea's "Crystal Silence." It was snowing lightly outside and it seemed like nothing could be more perfect than the moment I was living in.

The high lasted for days. I told everyone about the "Cosmic Puppy." It became a defining moment of who I was then.

A couple weeks later, back in Dover, I went to Philadelphia to see Yes at the Spectrum. I got there early, hoping to score some acid. I got some almost right away. I was standing down on the floor among all the empty seats. The house lights were still up and not many people were there yet. But the first guy I talked to had some blotter, so I bought it. I was by myself but I was confident in my strength. By the time Yes came on, I was full blown tripping.

The concert was fantastic, with the most amazing and incredible light show I could ever imagine that made the stage look like one of their album covers. At the climax of the show they hit a sustained note and froze in place on the stage, sliced by lasers that made it look like their heads and torsos were all over the stage. The crowed freaked.

On the way home I stopped at Burger King. 

Iapetus Falling

September 16, 1975 (cont.)

I have had two dreams in which the colors blue and green were prominent and I think I should tell you about them. The first was several years ago, when I was still in high school. In the dream I had a square pendent on a gold chain. The top half was blue and bottom half was green. The colors were shiny and metallic, like the copper trinkets with metallic powder my mom used to make in a small electric kiln in crafts at Red Raider Camp when we were little.

Wearing the pendant gave me the ability to fly. I would stand at the end of a field and a large crook-shaped stick would lift me up under my arm and carry me a few feet off the ground toward a group of trees that were in a bowl-like depression. The stick would carry me down to the middle of the trees and let go and I would soar up through the tree branches in a big backward arc and then lightly touch down. Then I would do it again. I don't now how many times I did this, but it was many and it was exhilarating. But I couldn't resist wanting to know what was holding the stick, because I was outside in an open field. I finally looked up at the stick and the dream ended.

The second dream was a few days after the Yes concert at the Spectrum. This was the one that stuck with me and became part of my artwork.

In the dream I had gone to a concert with two friends from high school, Laurie McLeod and Greg Caputo. But when we got there the concert hall was gone. There was nothing around except green grass and the outline of the building foundation. I looked over the horizon and suddenly the grass turned a deep emerald green and the sky turned a deep sapphire blue. They dazzled with iridescence. The planet Saturn appeared above the horizon and began growing larger.

The closer it came the more joy I felt. But it was so intense it made me afraid and I blinked my eyes and everything went back to normal. I asked my friends if they had seen it, but they had not. I looked again, and again everything turned deep green and deep blue and Saturn appeared. It was the most beautiful sight I had ever seen and I didn't want it to end. But every time it began coming closer I would become afraid of the powerful, joyful rush I was feeling, and I'd blink my eyes to make it stop.

I did this many times, each time letting Saturn get a little closer until I couldn't stand it anymore and then I'd make it stop. Finally, I decided to let it keep coming. I wouldn't blink. Saturn appeared and began growing larger and larger. I braced for it to fill the sky...

I woke up to the sound of my dad dropping his electric drill on the basement steps to my room with a loud crash. I never had the dream again, but whenever I see pictures of Saturn it always makes me catch my breath. I get a similar feeling now when I look at pictures of the Grand Canyon. 

Cosmic Poppy

September 16, 1975 (cont.)

Now I see that I am not and probably never was a "cosmic puppy" but that I had somehow contacted Poppy's spirit and that is what saved me from freaking out on the mescaline. It was Poppy who found James and it was James who found me.

I spent my first two weeks at Boonville in Big Jim's group. Big Jim had been Poppy's assistant during my first weekend. The next two weeks I spent in Alan Sayre's group, which was more intense, especially the weekend, which we spent at the sheep barn, the first group to have a seminar there.

Alan was tough and I really didn't like it, but I was determined to be perfect because I had a realization that I was meant to join the Family three years ago when I hitchhiked out to San Francisco in '72, but I failed because I freaked out when I had a ride with a satanic homosexual and I called my mom and she sent me a plane ticket even though she said she didn't have any money and I flew home the next day.

Back in Dover I broke my leg within a week. Leslie and I had decided to go horseback riding at a farm where a kid we knew named Sheldon and his family rented horses. It was autumn and the air was cool and there was a clear sky and Sheldon, Leslie and I were racing the ponies back and forth across a field. But I kept losing because my horse kept veering at a diagonal toward the barn. So I gave him a hard left rein and he ran straight and I won.

We were still galloping full speed at the end of the field when I eased up on the reins. The horse instantly turned 90 degrees to the barn and I slipped off sideways. I decided to get off before I fell off, and hit the ground hard on my chest. It knocked me out for a second. After a moment the first thing I felt was some discomfort in my leg. I lifted my head and looked back to see my right leg was bent in a bad break right in the middle of the shin. Somehow I got clipped by one of the horse's hooves, breaking both the tibia and fibula. Then the pain hit. I nearly passed out.

The broken leg was the indemnity I paid for not staying in San Francisco in '72 and joining the Family then. So I felt I had to do a lot of catching up. Onni says that if you're really sincere you can be perfect in three days, so I was determined to be sincere while in Alan's group.

But it turned out that I am arrogant in my sincerity, arrogant in my humbleness, not really willing to take full responsibility for the truth.

After that weekend I was put in Neal's flower-selling crew, but when it came time to go, I was not taken for some reason, which I still don't know, though I do know that I had not yet created oneness with Alan, so naturally when I didn't go on the flower trip I ended up back in Alan's group. Not only did I not get to do what I wanted to do the most, but I ended up where I wanted to be the least. But it was important that I learn, so I tried hard to serve Alan and I even got to center our trinity -- Susan's trinity -- a couple times because Susan's legs were bombed and she had to go lie down in the sisters' trailer.

I came much closer to understanding a leader's position, even with that little responsibility that I had. How difficult it can be to center people up. Unless you are totally centered, they will space out. I experienced such a sense of frustration from Bob and Karen and Agatha whenever they would space out, but I know it was as much my own space-outedness as theirs.

That weekend I heard Kristina lecture for the first time. In fact, it was the first time I had heard the primary lecture since I had first come back to the land four weeks earlier. That weekend really tied up the whole month for me. It is without a doubt the greatest month of my life to date.

I am now in my second week living at the San Francisco house, where life is much more intense and deeper and harder. But it's home like I have never experienced. Even on my first day I felt had lived here all my life.

San Francisco. St. Francis. I've heard a lot about San Francisco and the Grand Canyon, especially over the last week. Strange that I remember so well looking out over the canyon with the San Francisco peaks rising in the background. The most beautiful sight I have ever seen. A true masterpiece.

Today was a pretty good day, especially compared to yesterday, which was definitely an indemnity day. Mitch smashed the truck a little, even got a ticket at Powell and Market. I got thrown out, or rather escorted out of the Wells Fargo Bank and brought home my first guest, a bomb named Shelly who may have been brilliant at one time but is almost totally desensitized now. Even Kent said we just can't bring people like that home because they won't respond.

But today was different.

Well, first let me tell you about Friday, the last day of my first week in the city. It was fantastic. I sold out two or three times, was really feeling spiritual, even reached my goal of $50, even got $1 donation from a guy who couldn't stand that Reverend Moon group.

Then that weekend we went up to Boonville and I was in Sherri's group, which was a gas, like being a little kid.

So yesterday was a bomb. I started off today with a stomach ache, but I went out flower selling anyway and did OK and felt pretty good, fairly centered. Sold out on my second run. Went witnessing and met some most heavenly children, three of which came to dinner tonight -- Jamie, Amy and Joseph.

We were supposed to go to Berkeley tonight for some celebration, probably for the pioneers heading to New York, of which James is one. He is taking the Sony cassette deck that I gave him. I will miss him so much, even though we have hardly seen each other since our first weekend. Perhaps someday I too can go and really learn and live the heavenly standard from the highest source. HF be with him.